


are you the trouble I've been looking for?

by The Stephanois (ballantine)



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Ambiguous Employment Status!Billy, First Time, Future Fic, M/M, cop!steve, the hazy aimlessness of one's early twenties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-22
Updated: 2018-05-22
Packaged: 2019-05-10 00:45:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14726766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballantine/pseuds/The%20Stephanois
Summary: Billy Hargrove got marginally less psychotic after high school, but trying to read anything good into that would be like being relieved when the Zodiac killer stopped writing letters to the editor.





	1. fitting the piece back together

**Author's Note:**

> Title and mood of this fic brought to you by me listening to nothing but The Magnetic Fields all weekend.

_**1.** _

A late model brown Buick flew by and the radar gun beeped.

Steve blinked out of his reverie and looked down at the digital readout: a 77 that he absolutely cannot ignore, not if he ever wants to ever get off traffic duty. He sighed, tossed the radar gun into the passenger seat of his cruiser, and pulled out of the gravel crossover to give chase to Mrs. Ostrowski for the second time this month.

Claudia Ostrowski A.K.A. the speed devil of Roane County and probably the girl Wilson and Love were referring to when they wrote _Fun, Fun, Fun_. Steve would ordinarily be half in love despite the age difference, but he was pretty fed up with filing the paperwork over her write-ups.

She's a good quarter-mile ahead of him when he starts giving chase and pulls over on the shoulder just before that wicked hill on County D. By the time he sidles up alongside her car, she's got the window down and is smiling out at him amiably.

“License and registration?” he asked, redundant, trying to sound neutral but probably just coming up resentful. It had been a long day, okay?

She flicked out the necessities between two fingers, well-practiced; her smile only grew as he snatched them away (less-practiced).

“Stephen,” she said, because God forbid anyone in this town pretend they didn't know him, “your hair is finally growing out again!”

First time he pulled her over, he made the mistake of self-consciously rubbing a hand over his still-buzzed head. It was bad enough walking around knowing he looked like an idiot, he didn't need cool older ladies telling him.

He glanced up from the paperwork he had already seen three times in the past two months. “Uh – yeah. It's coming along.”

She beamed at him. “It looks good.”

Steve refused to be taken in by such obvious pandering to a known weak spot. He told her to wait while he grabbed his ticket clipboard.

It took no time at all to write up the ticket, and she accepted it with an almost awe-inspiring lack of repentance.

He leaned on the roof of her car and tried a frown on her. “You take care now, Mrs. Ostrowski – and please, drive safe.”

She gave him a wide smile. “You as well, Stephen, dear.”

And then she peeled off, leaving Steve to heave an impotent sigh in her literal dust.

He checked his watch and, after a moment's indecision, dug out a cigarette. He was supposed to be quitting because, really, smoking's for kids, but whatever. He smoked leaning up against his cruiser right there on the side of the road, watching the day die its slow-bruising death in the west.

And it was only Tuesday.

 

 

_**10.** _

It took a few seconds to remember where he was when he woke up, confused and feeling like a piece of fruit left out in the sun too long. He was on Hop's hangover couch, which was fitting because. He was hungover. So hungover.

For an insane couple seconds, he tried going back to sleep, but he could hear the morning noises of the office trickling in from the other room, so it wasn't to be. He opened bleary eyes, rolled over so he was no longer burrowed face-first into the sweat-sticky vinyl, and immediately found himself looking at the chief's unimpressed face staring at him from across his office desk.

“No,” he kind of moaned, hands hovering over his face because he didn't know if it would be less professional to hide it or to reveal his dehydrated misery in all its bloodshot glory.

“Oh, yes,” said Hop. “You know, Kid, you're damn lucky. The guys wanted to move you into the drunk tank when we found you this morning.”

Steve dropped his hands but couldn't for the life of him unscrunch his face. “Thanks for stopping them?”

“Hell, it wasn't me _._ I thought it was a good idea. Thank Florence. She thinks you're going through, and I quote, a _tough time_.” Hop glared, like daring him to agree. “Are you going through a tough time, Steve?”

 _Christ, was he ever._ “No sir.”

Hop sat back, glare evaporating. “Good. Now get out of my office.”

Steve gingerly sat up, swiveling out his legs – which were completely asleep thanks to the weird-ass position he'd passed out in, _ow –_ and generally trying his best not to look like he needed to throw up. He scrubbed a hand through his hair uncertainly. “So I'm not in trouble?”

“Oh, no, you're suspended for the rest of the week,” Hop said, turning the page of his newspaper and not bothering to look up. “What kind of place you think I'm running here?”

Steve nodded, fast. “Right.”

He tested his feet and stood, heading for the door and already bracing himself for the inevitable hooting and hollering that would surely follow him on his trek across the bullpen. Then Hop said his name again.

He paused and looked back. “Yes, Chief?”

Hop studied him for a couple seconds, face unreadable, but finally just said, “Go get your head on straight, Steve. I'll see you next Monday.”

And all Steve could do was nod, feeling obscurely grateful. He stepped out into the main floor of the station and met the wave of gleeful scorn like a man.

 

 

_**2.** _

The problem with Powell and Callahan, of course, is that they did things like leave before it's even ten. Yeah, it was a Tuesday night. But again – worth repeating! – not even _ten_.

Steve knew what was really up, of course. Powell was a family man and Callahan, well. He just knocked up his girlfriend, so Steve guessed he was a family man now too.

Steve had nothing against families, of course. They were the beating backbone of America, or whatever. He'd just been in a weird mood for the past few months, basically ever since he settled into his new position with the Hawkins Police.

He thought the job would fix things.

But here he was instead, sitting abandoned in this bar. It was hard not to think about certain things when he was left alone like this, things like how he always thought he'd be well on his own way to having a family by now. That seemed simple when he was younger, an uncomplicated but worthy destiny.

In his darker moments, ones he's not exactly proud of, he worried he was going to end up like the chief, forever circling back around to being kind of hung up on his high school girl, but too much of a bitter asshole to ever do anything about it. (Look, he loved Hop. Loved him like – well, not his dad. His dad was a raging asshole. But he loved Hop like he was his sitcom dad, and that was probably better. But dude _seriously_ needed to make a move already.)

He stared at the darts league bulletin board over on the wall near the door and wondered if he should join. The Hawkins community rec softball league wouldn't start up for a couple weeks yet, and he obviously had some time on his hands. He could play darts with men who had two decades on him and god, didn't that sound kind of fucking sad.

With the amount of bitching about work his dad always did, you'd think it had swallowed his life whole. But Steve's an adult with a very adult job, maybe the _most_ adult job you could have outside the president or whatever, okay, and some days it was like he had nothing _but_ time. His days stretched out before him, unvaried and unoccupied.

And on that note, he ordered another beer.

 

 

_**9.** _

After a while, he gave up on finding his keys and sat down heavily on the curb.

He checked his watch and realized it was too late to wake his neighbor to get his spare house key. He'd have to go sleep at the station or something. He rubbed a hand over the back of bowed head and stared sort of tiredly down at the pavement for a while.

He was kind of in shock, he thought. In shock and without a shock blanket or, or even a shirt. Where was his shirt? He raised his head and squinted across to where he and Billy had been standing, thought he could spot the crumpled pale blue fabric on the ground.

Steve blinked dully at that small fixed point. He thought about it, really thought about it, and realized that the whole thing with Billy, this cataclysmic thing, it had only taken like fifteen minutes.

“Jesus,” he muttered, swiping a hand back through his hair.

In a moment he'd go grab the shirt, though it seemed almost too great a risk to cross back over there. What if he came back out? The space in the alley already seemed like No Man's Land, Billy Hargove in his own trench in the bar, waiting to pick him off at a distance; Steve on this curb, shivering a little and thinking uselessly of home.

 

 

_**3.** _

Billy Hargrove got marginally less psychotic after high school, but trying to read anything good into that would be like being relieved when the Zodiac killer stopped writing letters to the editor.

Steve thought this so-called improvement was only because they were out of school now. High school was _easy_ , you know? It was easy to charm a crowd that had no choice but to be in the same building with you day-in and day-out. But out in the real world, people made you work for it. Steve saw Billy around town sometimes, still acting flashy and fast, like he couldn't admit that reality was catching up with him yet, and he'd think: soon enough, man.

It was a little different for Steve; he loved Hawkins and Hawkins, for the most part, had always loved Steve. He'd be surprised if there was anyone who loved Billy Hargrove.

After the night in the Byers' house, they'd avoided each other for the rest of senior year. Steve would've thought that-was-the-end-of-that, lets-pretend-the-other-guy-didn't-exist.

But he could never entirely stop being bothered by him, probably because Billy never stopped being really obviously bothered by _Steve_. They'd cross paths at Big Buy and it was like high noon every fucking time, Billy's eyes snapping to his over a pyramid of canned corn, the memory of Ennio Morricone overtaking the store's piped muzak.

It was no different that night.

Billy came swaggering into the bar trailing a pair of guys Steve thought he remembered from the year below in school. Billy spotted him immediately and course-corrected just enough to knock his shoulder hard into Steve's head, because he was nothing if not a grudge-fueled cliché.

And, okay, maybe Steve had his elbow ready and waiting to lash back at his ribs as he passed. What of it? He wasn't like Billy, trying to hold on to some glory days bullshit like a watered-down Springsteen that didn't even play baseball. He had a job and a life, the respect of the town (minus Mrs. Ostrowski).

“Hate that guy,” he muttered, and was rewarded by the bartender with a beer on the house.

He hunched forward over his tallboy and looked doggedly at the 8-inch TV sitting in the corner. It was top of the ninth and the A's were solidly up on the Tigers. If he squinted, Steve thought he could almost see Rickey Henderson edging out for a steal. Wasn't that more interesting than anything happening in this bar?

Across the room next to the pool table, Billy Hargrove laughed loudly and said something in that low, insulting tone that Steve knew all too well. The voices escalated. Moments later, Billy was roughly shoved, back cracking into a neon Schlitz sign.

Steve shook his head at Rickey Henderson and finished off his beer with a sense of martyred resignation. He pushed back his stool and stood up.

 

 

_**8.** _

Steve doesn't understand how someone who he – honest! – kind of forgot about when he wasn't front and center could so easily _get_ at him.

Every time they were near each other, it's like some switch got flipped inside Steve, casting him in a role he never wanted, in a story he didn't much like. Billy entered a room and Steve twisted and shrunk and jammed himself back into the form of that jerk he was when he was sixteen and clueless. Something in his blood would jump, ingrained response, fight or flight (and Steve had never once won a fight in his life except the two that really mattered, neither of which involved Billy fucking Hargove except as a minor footnote).

“You have some kind of problem with me, Harrington?” had to be the most hilarious question ever voiced.

“Yeah, of course I do,” said Steve, automatic. “You're a massive dick.”

His mouth twisted. “Small town boy like you doesn't know the meaning of the word.”

“Small town – right. You know, that line's getting kind of old, man. If you hate this place so much, why the hell are you _still here_?” It was something he wondered every single time he saw him around town.

An angry flush splashed across Billy's face, obvious even under the weak floodlight above the back door of the bar. He turned back from the door, and Steve, his wires were really screwed up now between the beer and the messing around and the endless faint confusion that came with Billy. Because there was no desire coming off the other guy as he advanced on Steve, but it sent a bolt of heat through him anyway.

He refused to back up, kept straight and still as Billy stepped up close ( _almost as close as when he_ – ) and said, “Is King Steve still feeling threatened that someone will take his place?”

“Drop that shit, all right?” Steve said, almost disgusted. “You could never _take my_ place. Jesus. You don't know anything about how to treat people right, you think everyone can't see that?”

And then – it was weird. Some ugly sidewinder of an emotion crossed Billy's face.

He braced himself for another shove or punch, but instead Billy lifted his hand. Steve's eyes widened in recognition at the glint of metal in his hands; somehow, Billy had his keys.

Steve knew better than to try and grab them back – he'd played that game on other kids on the school bus enough times, thanks. “Hey – all right now, wait a second – ”

Billy hefted the keys for another second, almost thoughtful, and then he drew back his arm and chucked them. Steve tracked their flight with unsteady, disbelieving eyes as they landed somewhere in the dark brush at the end of the alley, on the other side of the street.

He immediately gave pursuit. When he got to the other side of the street and thought to glance back, Billy was gone.

 

 

_**4.** _

At this point in the night, Steve's had a few, a few past steady. But he wasn't the keg king of Hawkins High for nothing.

He was fine. He was off-duty and fine and, besides, even off-duty it was kind of his job to keep this town safe. Usually he was more worried about the earth cracking open and devouring everyone whole, but some days it just meant stopping Billy Hargrove from stabbing another guy with a pool cue.

So he walked over.

Billy saw him coming and turned readily with one of those mad grins of his, like he'd been waiting for Steve to get involved. His eyebrows danced and his tongue flickered out – guy was always sticking that tongue out, licking at his lip like he was forever leaving his chapstick at home.

Steve wanted to tell him he should try to be a little less of a mess, but instead it came out something like, “Can't you leave people in peace for one damn night?” and then Billy shoved him.

Steve immediately shoved him back, arm braced like a cross bar against his chest. He got a rabbit punch to the nose for his trouble and took it badly – surprised, of all things. Steve never did get used to people wanting to hit him. Even Jonathan Byers only tried it the one time.

“Jesus, Harrington,” Billy sneered, “Aren't you a cop now? How are you still _this_ shitty in a fight?”

Steve let go of him, hand coming up automatically to cup around the agony in his nose – but Billy had other ideas, fisted a hand in his shirt and hauled him around. The line of buttons on his shirt gave out, ripping and scattering to the ground and then the bartender was telling them to take it outside and, fine.

 

 

_**7.** _

After, Billy rolled off and thumped against the wall beside him so their shoulders were still pressed together.

Steve knocked his head back against the bricks and just breathed. He could hear Billy right next to him, so close, also gulping in air like he just ran to home for the pennant. The thought was weird with victory.

Steve couldn't look at him, not yet, so he stared blankly out across the half-lit space behind the bar. The alley was strewn with trash and cigarette butts. It was ugly; it kind of smelled. He thought suddenly, randomly, of Powell and Callahan at home with their families and was badly confused.

Steve belatedly recognized the warm tickling trickle of wet track its way down from his nose, and just barely got an arm up to forestall it dripping to the ground. Without really thinking about it, he shrugged off the already-ruined shirt and bundled it up to hold to his bleeding nose.

Next to him, Billy snorted and dug around in his pocket for a fresh cigarette. He lit it and stood there, jeans still unbuckled, sweat gleaming on the stretch of skin above his gaping waistband. Steve narrowed his eyes at him, this confident golden jackass.

“This is your fault, you know,” he told him, glaring a little more because at least that felt normal. “You really nailed my nose in there, you fucker.”

“You're still on that?” Billy laughed out in amazement. He shook his head in amusement and did up the front of his jeans with his free hand.

A peculiar bolt of fear went through Steve, made him double-down on his point, because he knew how people should treat each other and this? Wasn't it. He was reeling, and somehow the sight of Billy shrugging off from the wall and running a casual hand back through his hair made him angry in a way he hadn't been in _years_ , maybe ever.

Then Billy turned back towards the door.

“Wait. Are you – you're going back in?” Steve asked in disbelief.

Billy paused. “Well, yeah. I still have most of a pitcher in there.” He gave him a look Steve couldn't hope to interpret. “You came on pretty quick, Harrington.”

And that was too much. Steve shoved off from the wall, strung tight like he hadn't just had a pretty therapeutic orgasm. Note to self: afterglow with Billy Hargrove? Kinda crappy.

 

 

_**5.** _

The back door slapped open against the wall and bounced back hard at Steve, who slipped through the shrinking opening like he was James Bond escaping with his life at the last second.

Which would probably make Billy the monologuing villain.

He followed him out into the back alley; ready for a fight, prepared to duck and throw a punch to make up for the one he can feel stinging his face. But that didn't happen. Instead, Billy spun away from the door and immediately lit a cigarette.

Steve waited a couple seconds, still amped up, off-balance. But Billy just gazed up at the slice of sky revealed over the roof of the neighboring building. He gazed and smoked and generally ignored him.

Steve shifted on his feet and asked, already feeling kind of lame, “You, uh. Have another one of those?”

He was penalized immediately with Billy angling a smirk around his cigarette at him. But to his destabilizing surprise, he didn't refuse – or actually say anything at all. Billy just drew out another cigarette from the pack in his pocket and switched it out with the one he'd been smoking.

His mouth closed around the fresh filter; he met Steve's eyes and brought up the lit cigarette to meet the end of the new one. Sucked in, cheeks hollowing out far beyond what Steve, as a seasoned smoker himself, knew was necessary. But it did the trick. The second cigarette was lit.

He wasn't exactly a gentleman, though; he handed Steve the older, half-smoked cigarette.

Steve took it, and he made the strategic mistake of glancing down at Billy's mouth.

 

 

_**6.** _

This was not _not_ fighting, Steve thought kind of hysterically as the other man pressed him up against the wall of the alley, one leg finding its way to press between his own, which were apparently feeling accommodating as hell because they shuffled right apart, like they'd been waiting twenty-two years to play bookend to Billy's thigh.

"I knew it," Billy kept muttering, the slice of his smirk flashing in Steve's peripherals like police lights in the rearview, a throwback to when the sight would send a jolt of panic to his brain. "I _knew_ it."

 _Knew what_ , Steve wanted to ask, but it's not like they were exactly on speaking terms at the moment. Billy dragged his tongue across his Adam's apple and it was like Steve was losing his mind, it was like putting his new service pistol to his head and pulling the trigger. The world was ending and he was hard in his jeans.

After a moment of caught stillness, he felt a gleeful tearing _fuck it._ He finally brought his hands up and pulled Billy in roughly by the hips. A shocky, dazed second as he felt Billy's dick against his own, nothing like Steve had ever thought to imagine.

Steve was out of his element, tried to cup the back of his head like he'd done to girls, but Billy took his wandering arm and twisted it down, half-painful, to pin against the wall. The message was clear – he could almost hear the man sneer at him: _don't make this soft_. So Steve shoved aside his impulses and made a turn, shoved back, more teeth, more pressure and hey, this was _totally_ like a fight.

Billy put his hand to Steve's belt and damn near ripped it as he undid the buckle. Did rip the button off his jeans, the thing flying off into the darkness by their side. Steve was following his lead, scraping the fuck out of his hand in his hurry to get at Billy and when he finally did, the other man let out a shuddering breath and dropped his head down on Steve's shoulder. They moved together like nothing had ever been easier.

They didn't kiss. Steve didn't know what he would've done if Billy Hargrove tried to kiss him.


	2. moving on

_**11.** _

Steve's car is still at the bar, but his car keys are on the same ring as his house keys, so that's out. He ignores the suggestion from Powell and Callahan that he take a ride in the back of one of their cruisers and waves off Florence's only slightly less mocking offer for a lift home.

He does steal one of Callahan's shirts from his locker – the one from the night before was way past salvage. He'd only kept it on because it was better than trying to explain the obvious hickey high up on his chest.

And then he is standing in the sunshine outside the station. It's still early, early enough that he can avoid the majority of prying eyes as he hoofs it across town. It's a fifteen-minute walk, and he feels every foot of it with his hangover, his body sore from sleeping twisted up on Hop's office couch.

He's ignoring the parts of him that feel kind of good, because there is a time and a place to have a sexuality crisis and Steve thinks before breakfast isn't it.

Everything feels heightened, different and new. Last time he looked around at Hawkins with new eyes like this, it had more to do with, you know, demogorgons and not the fact that he suddenly know what another guy's dick feels like in his hand. But aside from that, yeah, it seems pretty similar. The world feels both terrifyingly open and incredibly personal and it's confusing and all Steve wants to do is collapse right there on the sidewalk in a puddle of hangover sweat and emotions about, like, the blueness of the sky.

Okay, so maybe he's having a bit of crisis before breakfast.

The house is a welcome sight, a promise that if he's really going to lose it, it can at least be behind venetian blinds. (The house itself is nothing impressive – a tiny one-bedroom with ancient plumbing and paint flecking off all the window sills. Steve's been living there for almost a year, and he's still waiting to love it. It needs something, or maybe someone, he doesn't know.)

He's about to cut over to his neighbor's to get his spare key when he spots the front door. Steve jogs up the walkway.

His keyring is taped on the door along with a folded piece of paper. He takes it down and opens the note. In a cramped, crowded script, Billy had scrawled:

_You kind of had a point about it being time to blow this town, so thanks for that. Really._

_Don't let it go to your head. Really._

_Adios, Harrington._

Steve sits on his front step for a long time, clutching the jagged edges of his keys in one hand and the note in the other.


End file.
